Worcester, Fall River, Boston Voters Choose Rep. Nominees

Voters in the Democratic strongholds of Fall River, Worcester and Boston nominated candidates for three state representative seats in low turnout special election primaries on Tuesday.

Dan Cullinane, a former aide to Rep. Marty Walsh and former City Councilor Maureen Feeney, now Boston’s city clerk, swamped his Democratic rivals in a district comprising parts of Dorchester, Mattapan, Hyde Park and Milton. Cullinane rounded up 1,663 votes. There were no Republican candidates on the ballot for Boston and Milton seat.

In neighborhoods of Fall River and the Assonet section of Freetown, former Governor’s Councilor Carole Fiola racked up 1,493 votes, besting her three Democratic rivals, while David Steinhof, a Fall River dentist, took 339 votes for the Republican nomination, running unopposed.

In a district in the city of Worcester, Republican Carol Claros, a nurse at a prison in Concord, earned 111 votes running unopposed, while 26-year-old Democrat Dan Donohue edged his nearest rival Joshua Perro, 854 to 756.

The general election is Sept. 10.

The special elections were called to fill the seats of former Reps. David Sullivan, who is now heading up the Fall River Housing Authority, John Fresolo, who resigned under a cloud of suspicion, and Sen. Linda Dorcena Forry, who won her own special election to the upper chamber earlier this year.

In last November’s primary, Sullivan, took in 2,895 votes in the primary, Fresolo took in 716, and Forry took in 2,241, with all the Democratic representatives running unopposed in those races.

This program aired on August 14, 2013. The audio for this program is not available.